[B]Chapter 76: The Cookie Incident [Becky]

Becky completed her final set of stretches to round out her morning workout at the Argo's gym. Okay, fine. Mid-morning workout. It was her day off so she didn't feel the need to get up super duper early just to make her usual pilates class. Instead, she got up late, caught the end of the horrendous mash Lbrvr put together for breakfast, and then came to the gym for her own workout.

But now that she'd finished, she had the rest of her day to relax. It felt like it'd been ages since she got a day off with Lusac constantly off on missions or out for injuries. She'd been excited when they brought another Human onboard to share the chore of maintenance in the Fsylan tubes until he'd been added to the mission roster as well.

Becky would have loved to get off the ship for those sorts of exciting things, but her g-sickness made her a poor fit for the excursions. She barely held her stomach together for the few trips down to planets she did make, and hearing Lus talk about Zer-Dasht's severe lack of piloting skills made her certain that it was better she stuck to the Argo where she could trust whoever was at the helm.

It was almost always Oaty now since they had yet to find a new copilot to replace Yonnex-Quniwel.

She shuddered as she remembered her friend. He definitely didn't deserve that fate, but she found solace in knowing that he might be at peace after the terrible things he'd endured.

Becky kept her pace slow as she walked back to her quarters. It was nice to not be in a rush to get anywhere in particular. She did feel bad for Yrqw who had to try and manage all the maintenance tasks alone today, but it wasn't her fault they stole Lusac away for some fancy long term assignment. Word was that it could be weeks before they saw him again, and she was not looking forward to the long hours required to cover for his absence.

A screechy meow greeted Becky as she stepped into her room. She smiled and scooped Avil up in her arms. The one good thing about Lusac being gone was that she got Avil full-time. Suns, sometimes it seemed that she spent more time with this cat than his actual owner.

But she didn't mind. Avil was adorable, even if he could be a handful.

"And how's my beautiful boy today?" Becky hugged the cat close as he curled close to her, purring in response.

"I've got something fun planned for us," she informed as she set him down so she could clean up. "But it's a surprise, so you'll just have to wait."

Avil meowed, either protesting the short cuddled session or the surprise, but Becky only laughed as she stripped her clothes off and went to the bathroom.

After showering and getting ready for the day, she returned to her neatly organized room. Her bed was in one corner, already made up with a special quilt she got from her grandmother before leaving her home planet Brilles.

Her parents were both Runners so Becky had been half-raised by her grandparents, and she'd always known when the time came she'd join the Runners. Her dad had tried to get her on the ship where he and her mom worked, but Becky wanted to make her own way in the organization so she opted to start at a lower rank on a smaller ship. In the end, it'd been a great decision since she loved (nearly) every member of the Argo's crew.

In a lot of ways this place felt more like home than anywhere else in the whole Cinder Rock Galaxy.

"Come on, Avil. Surprise time." She tucked her holonovel under one arm and Avil under the other as she exited her quarters and made her way to the mess hall.

It was mostly cleaned up from breakfast, and the windows outside showed the brilliant swirl of colors of the Astral Highway. This room was her favorite place on the whole ship thanks to the windows. Nowhere else had quite so good of a view as they traveled.

The mess hall was also completely empty, just as it always was outside of meal times. That made it a good place for reading given the ship didn't have an official library. Apparently Runners weren't typically bibliophiles.

"It's yours to explore, buddy," she said as she set the cyclops cat down.

Avil remained where he was, hesitantly looking around.

Becky gestured wide. "Go on. Find something to climb on or sniff. It's good for you to get out once in a while."

The cat stared warily ahead, and Becky rolled her eyes.

"Fine. Your loss. But this is where I'm hanging out for a couple of hours, so get comfortable."

Avil followed behind as she went to one of the tables near the windows and sat down. He climbed on the seat next to her and curled up, his girth taking up much of the chair's seat.

"You need a diet," she mumbled as she took in the extra belly rolls he'd developed since she first met him.

He said nothing as he set his head on his paws and closed his eyes.

Becky smiled and resisted the urge to take a bunch of pictures to show Lus later. Reasonably Lusac knew how cute his cat was. Instead, Becky got out her holonovel and started up the screen.

It was one she'd read before, but it was among her favorite books, so she was still excited to reread and once again experience the ride of emotions it put her through. She'd been reading about an hour–and Avil had napped the whole time–when her stomach decided it wanted an early lunch.

"Ugh." Becky checked her watch. "Lunch isn't for another hour and a half." Her stomach rumbled again. "Maybe there's a snack in the kitchen."

She poked Avil's belly. "Be good, chubbster."

He opened his single eye to glare at her as she stood up and went to the kitchen at the back. It was a mess. Then again, it was almost always a mess since the ship typically had three different cooks use it in a day.

Becky sidestepped some of the more disgusting bits on the floor and made her way to the interbox. She looked inside, but nothing caught her attention. It was all savory, meal type stuff, and she was looking for something small and sweet. Just enough to satisfy her until lunch.

With the interbox a bust, she moved on to the nitrobox in hopes of finding some easily microwaved thing or maybe even ice cream. Thinking of the creamy deliciousness, she dug all the way through the nitrobox and then came across something interesting.

It wasn't ice cream, but it was a good enough option B.

Cookies.

Chocote chunk cookies even, her favorite.

Becky grabbed out only a few, hardly enough to even be missed, and replaced the container in the nitrobox before reburying it. She doubted it belonged to anyone important, and even so, they wouldn't know it was her who stole a couple.

Once the nitrobox was put back together, Becky tried a bite of one of the cookies.

It was actually more of a gnaw given how frozen solid the treat was, but eventually she managed to get a sufficient mouthful.

She sighed as the buttery, sweet goodness softened on her tongue. That hit the spot perfectly. Taking another bite, she exited the kitchen back into the mess hall only to discover chaos had erupted in her brief absence.

Relf and Hlnwr had shown up, and from what she could guess, they'd managed to piss Avil off really good. Enough that the adorable cat was gone and replaced by a four foot tall cyclops flipping over tables and chairs while screaming.

Relf and Hlnwr screamed back at him, the former tossing condiment bottles and napkin holders at Avil while Hlnwr chased him around shouting curses and threats at the former cat.

"What's going on here?" Becky shouted. She stuffed her precious cookies in her pocket, choosing to accept pocket lint over the risk of having them stolen by those two bozos.

"We came in to grab some coffee on our break, and this thing got all mad," Relf said. He glared at her with cutting eyes. She wondered if he'd ever move on from her rejection, but so far, it wasn't looking likely.

"His name is Avil, and he only gets like this when he's threatened, so what did you do to him?" Becky crossed her arms.

"We just tried to play with him. But now look at the mess." Hlnwr gestured to the overturned furniture and strewn objects.

"Well apologize so he calms down. He's not going to stop until you two say sorry." Becky knew this from her own experience when she first catsat Avil and accidentally triggered his cyclops form.

"I-I'm not apologizing to a cat." Relf's mouth quavered, his determination faltering.

"Yeah. That's stupid."

Becky's hands curled into fists. She was so mad she could scream. "Look here, you jerks. This is my day off, and I was trying to enjoy a nice day of reading. You're the ones who came in and screwed things up. Now the least you can do is try to repair some small part of the damage."

"Sorry, Avil." Hlnwr said suddenly in a twist she hadn't seen coming.

"You too, Relf." Becky stared him down, and she couldn't help but notice that he didn't have his usual overly confident and aggressive stance that he started with.

"Of course. Sorry, Avil." Relf said it without another word of argument to Becky's surprise.

The cyclops looked over his shoulder at Becky who nodded. He then shrank down to his cat form and came up to her full of screechy meows.

Relf turned her, his head pointed at the floor. "And sorry to you, Becky. We didn't mean to ruin your day off."

"Huh? Oh, it's fine. Stuff happens." Becky glanced between the two, both of whom seemed genuine in their apologies. This should have been a much bigger argument. In fact, she wouldn't have guessed in a million years that they would apologize to Lusac's cat. "You two should get going. I'm going to try and clean this up before lunch."

"No, no. Let us do it. It's our fault, like you said." Hlnwr immediately pulled the chair from her grasp as she stooped down to it.

"It's fine. I'm the one who left the cyclops cat unattended." These two were acting strange. Very strange, and the last thing she wanted was to be in their debt. Gag.

"Don't be ridiculous. We're the ones who antagonized the cat. You should take him and go. Enjoy your day off. We'll handle this," Relf concurred.

Becky looked between them dumbfounded. They seemed sincere in this offer. "And what will it cost me down the line?"

"Cost you? Nothing. This is our mess, so we'll be the ones to clean it." Hlnwr was already working on putting the tables back up.

"We insist you let us do this. Take Avil and go. Sorry again for the interruption to your day." Relf grabbed Avil off the floor and shoved the cat into her arms.

"Well, if you're sure." She wasn't about to argue her way into cleaning this disaster up, and best she could tell, Relf and Hlnwr were actually going to do it. It was still odd though.

"We're sure." The Kremel smiled at her.

Becky shrugged, retrieved her holonovel from the back table, and left the mess hall behind. As she walked back to her quarters, she replayed the situation over and over in her mind. Those two had started out so hostile, but after a brief conversation they were bending over backwards to help her out. It didn't make sense.

She shifted to carry Avil in one arm and used her free hand to retrieve the cookies from her pocket. They'd fully thawed out now, and she didn't want the chocote to melt into her clothes.

Whose cookies were they after all? Clearly someone wanted to keep them hidden, but they weren't labeled so reasonably they didn't belong to anyone with any kind of seniority. And they were homemade. Who had those kinds of cooking skills?

Her feet slowed as she reached the inevitable conclusion.

Lusac had a system, his class was [Chef]. While he didn't share details about it, it wasn't too much of a stretch to assume that some of the food he made had special effects.

Becky looked at the cookies in her hand with a smile. As tasty as they were, having the power available for later would come in handy so she planned to save them and use only one a day.

Picking up the pace, Becky almost laughed to herself thinking of Lusac of all people having made them. It did make a girl wonder though? What else could her [Chef] friend conjure up?

She didn't know for sure when she'd see him again, but once she got the chance, she was going to fully interrogate him about this new system of his. What was the point of having a powerful friend if she didn't get any benefits from it anyway?

Becky now had more than one reason to be excited for Lusac to finish his mission.